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Cardiac

For treatment that’s close to the heart, come to the heart of Wyoming.

Location & Parking

Our Cardiac Cath Lab is located on the third floor of the Center Tower, accessible off the Center Elevators. After treatment, many patients may be moved to the Progressive Care Unit on the fifth floor of Center Tower for recovery. If you have a pre-scheduled procedure or test, read more about checking in here.

Parking is available at the West Tower main entrance. Use the valet parking from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Friday or the west parking garage.

Call 911 at first sign of heart attack

Heart attacks are medical emergencies that require immediate treatment. At the first signs of heart attack, call 911. Do not lie down to see if the symptoms pass. Do not ask a friend or loved one to drive you to the hospital. Above all else, don’t think you can drive to the hospital yourself.

WARNING SIGNS

The classic signs of heart attack are a sharp pain in your chest radiating to your left arm. But the warning signs can present as a much wider and harder-to-identify array of symptoms. They may start slowly, presenting as mild pain and discomfort, and may develop over days or weeks. They can feel like symptoms of other ailments, including heart burn, making them easy to discount.

Cardiologist Adrian Fluture recommends that you carefully weigh any pain or discomfort “from belt to teeth” if you think you might be suffering a heart attack. Play it safe. If there is any doubt, call 911.

The more of the following symptoms present, the greater the likelihood of heart attack:

Any pain, tightness, heaviness, pressure or squeezing in the chest. It may even feel like heart burn or a generalized apprehension or uncomfortable feeling.

Pressure or pain spreading to the neck, jaw, left shoulder or both shoulders. You may feel tingling or numbness in the left arm and forearm, spreading to the inside of the arm. It may migrate to between the shoulder blades or, occasionally, to the back or spine.

Feelings of fullness, pain or indigestion in the stomach.

Shortness of breath or cold sweating with no good explanation.

Call 911

In the treatment of heart attacks, time means muscle: The quicker a blocked vessel is opened, the less muscle tissue dies and the better chance a patient has at survival. Recent data from the American College of Cardiology’s National Cardiovascular Data Registry shows that Wyoming Medical Center’s treatment time is among the fastest 10 percent in the country. But only if patients get to us in time.

When a patient calls 911, we shave an average of 10 to 11 minutes off door-to-balloon time – the time from when a patient arrives at the emergency room to the time a balloon is inflated in the blocked vessel. Our ambulances are miniature, mobile emergency rooms and treatment begins in the field when patients call 911.

“Everything that we need to do at the hospital is already prepared when the patient is rolling in by ambulance. The whole time to treatment will be much shorter,” says Dr. Fluture.

Region's best heart care

Our cardiac services focus on what matters most to the health and well-being of your heart. Through our vast heart and vascular services, you can find the comprehensive treatment you need to strengthen your heart and get back to normal.

Wyoming Medical Center's EMS team won the American Heart Association's Gold level award for quick care of heart attack patients. Read more here.

Cath labs are exam rooms with diagnostic imaging equipment used to support catheterization procedures. Wyoming Medical Center has two state-of-the-art single plane units, one of which can provide three-dimensional views of the coronary arteries.

Cardiac diagnostic and therapeutic procedures performed in our cath labs include angiograms, closure of some congenital heart defects, treatment of stenotic heart valves and pacemaker implantations. Most cath lab procedures are performed under local anesthesia.

Cardiac tests

In Cardiac Catheterization, a catheter is inserted into a large artery where it is then guided through the blood vessels and into the heart. This allows the physician to visually see and evaluate the heart’s health.

Exercise Stress Tests measure your heart rate while engaged in physical activity such as walking on a treadmill.

Electrocardiograms, or EKGs, are used to better evaluate your heart’s rhythm, diagnose poor blood flow to the heart muscle, diagnose abnormalities in the heart, or diagnose a heart attack. This test is performed by a device connected to the patient through electrodes placed near the heart. The electrodes send information to the device where it then records on graph paper the electrical activity of the heart. All Wyoming Medical Center ambulances are equipped with EKGs that can send the results directly to our Emergency Room, activating our cardiac team before heart attack patients even reach the hospital.

Echocardiograms are similar to EKGs but use ultrasound waves to create graphic images of the heart. This allows physicians to evaluate the heart’s structures, pumping ability and blood flow direction.

Chest X-Rays allow physicians to see internal structures of the heart to determine any abnormalities or areas of concern.

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is similar to an X-ray but uses large magnets and radio-frequency waves to produce the images of internal structures of the heart. These images provide physicians with more detailed information than an X-ray can provide by creating moving images of the heart while it’s pumping.

Cardiac treatments

Angioplasty, now called Percutaneous Coronary Intervention or PCI, is commonly performed on patients with heart failure, coronary artery disease or peripheral artery disease to reopen blockages in the arteries. Through a catheter, a deflated balloon is inserted into the artery where the blockage is located. When in the right location, the balloon is inflated to push open the artery. Once the artery is fully open, the balloon is removed. This removes the blockage and allows blood to flow freely through the artery.

Coronary Artery Bypass, or bypass surgery, reroutes the blood supply around a blocked section of the artery by relocating healthy blood vessels from a leg or chest wall to the heart. Blood then flows freely around the blocked section.